Residents of the besieged city of Mariupol had to bury their dead right outside the block where they lived. The constant shooting and lack of space in the graves are the reasons.

This is an independent online newspaper Jellyfish who reported this.

Images in recent weeks show how the Russian offensive has devastated the port city on the Sea of ​​Azov. For a long time, experts believed that it was a matter of time before the city would fall, but the Ukrainian troops held out. Before the Russian invasion, Mariupol had 400,000 inhabitants. The streetscape is now characterized by bombed buildings and extensive destruction. Many have been evacuated, but there are still 100,000 civilians left, according to Deputy Prime Minister of Ukraine Iryna Vereshchuk.

To Free Radio Europe Mariupol resident Roman Amelyakin explained what they had done to all the dead:

– First, the authorities and funeral homes try to collect the dead. There is an old grave in the middle – a trench was dug there, and people were buried there in mass graves.

The trench filled up very quickly and they tried to dig another one, but to no avail, so they decided to dig a mass grave in the city park. It also didn’t work because even those who volunteered to help collect the dead were afraid of bombing, Amelyakin said according to Radio Free Europe.

– The dead are then buried in the courtyard of the apartment block and in the garden. Often they are just wrapped in blankets and left by the roadside.

Images from Reuters and Tass news agencies, among others, show people digging graves just outside the apartment block. Those who managed to get it, put the cross on the grave in the usual way.

The battle for Mariupol was brutal, and the most dramatic incident occurred on March 16 when the city’s Donetsk theater was bombed. There must have been 1,300 people in the theatre, clearly marked with “kids” on the ground outside – and which should be visible from the air.

The mayor of Mariupol, Vadim Boychenko, snorted at the Russian accusations that they had come to “liberate” the city.

– His task is to destroy Mariupol from the surface of the earth – along with the townspeople, he told the news agency Unity.

– This is a genocide, can not be called anything else, the mayor believes.

– This is Putin’s war crime, which was committed by the armed forces of the Russian Federation together with all the generals. A military tribunal awaits Putin and the rest of the Russian army afterward, according to Vadim Boychenko, who stated that 50 percent of the city’s residents were Russian before the war started.

He did not know how many civilians were killed, but said there were “thousands”. According to the mayor, 90 percent of the city’s apartment blocks were damaged. He believed that 40 percent could no longer be recovered, Unian wrote.

The United Nations announced on Friday Security that they had received information about mass graves in Mariupol. One of the graves should contain 200 bodies.

Matilda Bognar at the UN told UN newspapers it had accepted allegations that Russia had killed civilians in cars during the evacuation. They have documented several cases of kidnapping Ukrainian politicians, who appear to be hostages.